Вальтер Скотт: St. Ronan's Well

“Call your own servant, sir,” answered the fellow, with the true insolence of a pampered menial.

“Your master,” answered Tyrrel, “ought to have taught you good manners, my friend, before bringing you here.”

“Sir Bingo Binks is my master,” said the fellow, in the same insolent tone as before.

“Now for it, Bingie,” said Mowbray, who was aware that the Baronet's pot-courage had arrived at fighting pitch.

“Yes!” said Sir Bingo aloud, and more articulately than usual – “The fellow is my servant – what has any one to say to it?”

“I at least have my mouth stopped,” answered Tyrrel, with perfect composure. “I should have been surprised to have found Sir Bingo's servant better bred than himself.”

“What d'ye mean by that, sir?” said Sir Bingo, coming up in an offensive attitude, for he was no mean pupil of the Fives-Court – “What d'ye mean by that? D – n you, sir! I'll serve you out before you can say dumpling.”

“And I, Sir Bingo, unless you presently lay aside that look and manner, will knock you down before you can cry help.”

The visitor held in his hand a slip of oak, with which he gave a flourish, that, however slight, intimated some acquaintance with the noble art of single-stick. From this demonstration Sir Bingo thought it prudent somewhat to recoil, though backed by a party of friends, who, in their zeal for his honour, would rather have seen his bones broken in conflict bold, than his honour injured by a discreditable retreat; and Tyrrel seemed to have some inclination to indulge them. But, at the very instant when his hand was raised with a motion of no doubtful import, a whispering voice, close to his ear, pronounced the emphatic words – “Are you a man?”

Not the thrilling tone with which our inimitable Siddons used to electrify the scene, when she uttered the same whisper, ever had a more powerful effect upon an auditor, than had these unexpected sounds on him, to whom they were now addressed. Tyrrel forgot every thing – his quarrel – the circumstances in which he was placed – the company. The crowd was to him at once annihilated, and life seemed to have no other object than to follow the person who had spoken. But suddenly as he turned, the disappearance of the monitor was at least equally so, for, amid the group of commonplace countenances by which he was surrounded, there was none which assorted to the tone and words, which possessed such a power over him. “Make way,” he said, to those who surrounded him; and it was in the tone of one who was prepared, if necessary, to make way for himself.

Mr. Mowbray of St. Ronan's stepped forward. “Come, sir,” said he, “this will not do – you have come here, a stranger among us, to assume airs and dignities, which, by G – d, would become a duke, or a prince! We must know who or what you are, before we permit you to carry your high tone any farther.”

This address seemed at once to arrest Tyrrel's anger, and his impatience to leave the company. He turned to Mowbray, collected his thoughts for an instant, and then answered him thus: – “Mr. Mowbray, I seek no quarrel with any one here – with you, in particular, I am most unwilling to have any disagreement. I came here by invitation, not certainly expecting much pleasure, but, at the same time, supposing myself secure from incivility. In the last point, I find myself mistaken, and therefore wish the company good-night. I must also make my adieus to the ladies.”

So saying, he walked several steps, yet, as it seemed, rather irresolutely, towards the door of the card-room – and then, to the increased surprise of the company, stopped suddenly, and muttering something about the “unfitness of the time,” turned on his heel, and bowing haughtily, as there was way made for him, walked in the opposite direction towards the door which led to the outer hall.

“D – me, Sir Bingo, will you let him off?” said Mowbray, who seemed to delight in pushing his friend into new scrapes – “To him, man – to him – he shows the white feather.”

Sir Bingo, thus encouraged, planted himself with a look of defiance exactly between Tyrrel and the door; upon which the retreating guest, bestowing on him most emphatically the epithet Fool, seized him by the collar, and flung him out of his way with some violence.

“I am to be found at the Old Town of St. Ronan's by whomsoever has any concern with me.” – Without waiting the issue of this aggression farther than to utter these words, Tyrrel left the hotel. He stopped in the court-yard, however, with the air of one uncertain whither he intended to go, and who was desirous to ask some question, which seemed to die upon his tongue. At length his eye fell upon a groom, who stood not far from the door of the inn, holding in his hand a handsome pony, with a side-saddle.

“Whose” – said Tyrrel – but the rest of the question he seemed unable to utter.

The man, however, replied, as if he had heard the whole interrogation. – “Miss Mowbray's, sir, of St. Ronan's – she leaves directly – and so I am walking the pony – a clever thing, sir, for a lady.”

“She returns to Shaws-Castle by the Buck-stane road?”

“I suppose so, sir,” said the groom. “It is the nighest, and Miss Clara cares little for rough roads. Zounds! She can spank it over wet and dry.”

Tyrrel turned away from the man, and hastily left the hotel – not, however, by the road which led to the Aultoun, but by a footpath among the natural copsewood, which, following the course of the brook, intersected the usual horse-road to Shaws-Castle, the seat of Mr. Mowbray, at a romantic spot called the Buck-stane.

In a small peninsula, formed by a winding of the brook, was situated, on a rising hillock, a large rough-hewn pillar of stone, said by tradition to commemorate the fall of a stag of unusual speed, size, and strength, whose flight, after having lasted through a whole summer's day, had there terminated in death, to the honour and glory of some ancient baron of St. Ronan's, and of his stanch hounds. During the periodical cuttings of the copse, which the necessities of the family of St. Ronan's brought round more frequently than Ponty would have recommended, some oaks had been spared in the neighbourhood of this massive obelisk, old enough perhaps to have heard the whoop and halloo which followed the fall of the stag, and to have witnessed the raising of the rude monument by which that great event was commemorated. These trees, with their broad spreading boughs, made a twilight even of noon-day; and, now that the sun was approaching its setting point, their shade already anticipated night. This was especially the case where three or four of them stretched their arms over a deep gully, through which winded the horse-path to Shaws-Castle, at a point about a pistol-shot distant from the Buck-stane. As the principal access to Mr. Mowbray's mansion was by a carriage-way, which passed in a different direction, the present path was left almost in a state of nature, full of large stones, and broken by gullies, delightful, from the varied character of its banks, to the picturesque traveller, and most inconvenient, nay dangerous, to him who had a stumbling horse.

The footpath to the Buck-stane, which here joined the bridle-road, had been constructed, at the expense of a subscription, under the direction of Mr. Winterblossom, who had taste enough to see the beauties of this secluded spot, which was exactly such as in earlier times might have harboured the ambush of some marauding chief. This recollection had not escaped Tyrrel, to whom the whole scenery was familiar, who now hastened to the spot, as one which peculiarly suited his present purpose. He sat down by one of the larger projecting trees, and, screened by its enormous branches from observation, was enabled to watch the road from the Hotel for a great part of its extent, while he was himself invisible to any who might travel upon it.